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Bankers Gonna Bank

It would seem that we should never be surprised by another bank scandal. Over the course of history haven’t we already witnessed and been victimized by every scheme that the banksters could come up with? Apparently not. The news revealing Wells Fargo’s recent firing of over five thousand employees was not a tale of layoffs that we the public could identify and sympathize with. Rather, it’s a tale of unbridled greed and a culture where rules are meant for the “other guys”.

Wells Fargo chose to incentivize their employees to open new accounts for customers. The incentives worked. The fired workers were found to have opened thousands of accounts for customers without the customers authorization. Some times these accounts created overdraft situations that netted the bank additional fees. Pretty immoral, right? Turns out it’s illegal, in addition to immoral.

Meantime the beneficiaries of the good work done by these workers take their bonuses and continue on as if nothing happened. It is reported that Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf made $19.3 million in 2015. That’s a lot of money to preside over a culture of dishonest people. Maybe his salary should be adjusted downward until he is able to create what we now consider an anomaly, an honest bank.